In today’s society media is such a huge part of life.  Media tells us all sorts of news and we have numerous styles of media.  However, in a world that is ran by media, who runs the media?  What is the deciding factor of media?  Who decides what media we get?  Well, I believe it’s us; we do.  That doesn’t mean that there aren’t certain media’s that are important and necessary, but for the most part we are given the media that we want.  There is just so much variety in the world that any kind of media that people want, they can get.  In North American society, media is driven more by the wants of the people rather than what they should know.

            Media plays a huge role in pop culture in North America because it helps to inform society of fads and other influential events/styles in popular culture.  In the textbook, Media and Society, it states that “The media’s huge range of cultural information and entertainment contributes to the development of popular knowledge.” (O’Shaughnessy & Stadler, 12)  This is a great job by the media knowing what wants to be heard by their audience in North America.  By the media informing people of this news it draws in a large youthful audience which wants to hear more of the same news about their favourite celebrities.  The news is rarely ever important world news, or if there is world news it is followed up by the latest pregnant celebrity.  Media is required to do this now to satisfy their majority audience and survive as a company or source of media.  In the textbook it states that the need for popularity is necessary because “…the media must satisfy their popular audience, which is predominantly working-class and about 50 per cent female.” (O’Shaughnessy & Stadler, 37)  Like any other business or resource, they do what must be done to survive.

I truly believe that society gets what it wants in terms of media.  This is solely due to the necessity to satisfy the majority.  If one source of media doesn’t satisfy someone then they can find what they want from another.

Works Cited:

O’Shaughnessy, Michael, and Jane Stadler. Media and Society. 5th ed. Australia: Oxford

University Press, 2012. Print.


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